A UN monitoring team looking into recent attacks in eastern DRC has documented sexual attacks against 28 youths, including one boy, according to a statement released on Friday.
A communiqué from the office of Radhika Coomaraswamy, the UN special representative for children in armed conflict, said the children subjected to sexual violence ranged in age from 12 years to 17 years. She said the investigation was continuing.
There was no mention of the four baby boys who local aid workers said were among 242 people raped in rebel attacks from July 30 to August 4.
The monitoring team is also looking into reports that other eight minors were treated for sexual abuses in the town of Rubonga, but has not been able to confirm those cases, the note said.
The attacks on several villages took place within kilometres of a UN peacekeeping camp for about 80 Indian soldiers, and thousands of Congolese troops based at Walikale, a 90-minute drive from the villages, raising questions about why nothing was done.
Survivors have said their attackers were Congolese Mai-Mai militia as well as members of the FDLR rebel group led by perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide who fled across the border to
Congo in 1994 who have been terrorising the population in eastern DRC ever since. The Rwandan rebel group has denied the reports.
On Tuesday, the UN envoy in charge of sexual violence in conflict urged the DRC government to prosecute the perpetrators and also warned leaders of the rebel and militia groups that they could be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court because widespread and systemic sexual violence can constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Rape has become a weapon of war in DRC, where rebels and soldiers are enriching themselves from mining precious minerals, often used forced and child labour. – Sapa-AP